Ocean-shade
by NotATypeWriter
Summary: They meet, they have breakfast together, and they talk. The line seperating them as strangers slowly vanishes. blind!Kaito x Shin'ichi. Kaishin, Shinkai (very reversible), Oneshot, complete.


_Hello there!_

 _This story came by in a way I can't even remember. It just happened._

 _Just to be sure there are no confusions: Kaito is blind, you'll know how much in the story. So by default, he's not KID, he also doesn't perfom any magic tricks in this story. Shin'ichi is a detective, that didn't change. They're older (also mentionned in the story but much later, so…)_

 _English isn't my first language and without sounding too full of myself I believe I do have a fair grip on it, but I make mistakes, so yeah, sorry about that. Let's just hope it doesn't fuck the story and clarity inconveniently._

 _Also, I am not blind nor are any of my close relatives, so I apologise if I've made a mess of the thing. If it's devastatingly wrong in all ways, just tell me, like any other mistakes that are painful to read. I'll understand._

 _I'll stop witting here and leave you to the story._

 _Enjoy !_

* * *

Something was wrong.

Kaito stood at the crossroad, tentatively making a single step off the sidewalk, but backtracking right away. Cars didn't stop longly as usual, they were acting as though they were facing a STOP circulation sign, not traffic lights.

Which meant the traffic lights were all funky.

He kept checking right and left, even though in his situation it changed absolutely nothing and didn't help the slightest. He couldn't make out whether other cars were coming from afar, and relying on his hearing alone wasn't an option since the town was filled with the sound of civilisation and, as a matter of fact, cars rolling about.

When he looked around himself, blue blended with incongruous darker shapes, lighter disheveled green spots hither thither blurred along in smears of light breaking in sharp pieces as though straight out of a kaleidoscope. Actually, he couldn't see anything, didn't know what things looked like. His vision was an abstract painting in troubled water.

And his incapacity at crossing the street was a pain in the ass.

He could discern many shadows passing by, pedestrians, steps fading away before he could ask help. It wasn't something he had to do, ever, which was the reason he didn't have a white cane either. He never felt like he needed help in any kind of ways because of his incredible spatial ability. He could remember any layouts of wherever he walked into, could guide himself in a crowd without bumping anyone and with his hands in his pockets—it was all about listening and intuitions that had developed further and taken over where his eyes gave up.

But crossing a street when no drivers had the clue he couldn't see, and when the traffic lights were deficient? That was one hell of a challenge, and one he could have lived without.

He sighed heavily, running a hand in his hair people assured were the colour of dark chocolate. He was starting to be tired, and found himself ruminating on the white cane he never used, the one against a wall somewhere in his bedroom. If he'd known he needed it that day, he swore.

"Excuse me," came a voice to his left, and he turned his head to where the sound came from. A shadowy figure blending with wirls of light and blurring into a 2D picture stood there. His voice was calm, beautiful, mysterious. Kaito liked that. "Do you need help crossing the street?"

Kaito _loved_ that. He felt relief overflowing his body, and he brought both his hands to rest on the stanger's shoudlers. That was something else he could do; motor himself so flawlessly it made people question his eyesight. "Yes, yes I do. I do and you are lovely."

"Okay," he stammered, Kaito feeling him tensed under his gentle grip. His hands were swiftly removed by a movement the other made with his arms, and soon enough, he could feel a hand holding tightly at the crook of his elbow. The man smelled of black coffee, his clothes of a soft, lingering smell of softener sheet. "Hold on a sec," he drawled, and by how he felt him move at his side, Kaito deduced he was looking left and right, far away to both sides. "Let's go."

His arm was pulled at, and he knew how to take his first step off the sidewalk without flopping ungracefully to the ground. Their walking pace wasn't fast, but rather slow, calculated, and the presence beside him felt strong, fearless.

"Careful," the stranger said as Kaito felt his arm being lifted, and he took it as a cue to step on the sidewalk. "Here you go." There was a hint of a smile in that, and Kaito returned the smile towards where the voice undoubtedly came from.

"I feel like 'thank you' isn't enough to express my gratefulness." He raised his arm to across the street. "I've been standing there for like, ten minutes."

"I know," the other said, and Kaito quirked an eyebrow. He knew? "At first, I thought you were waiting for someone, but you looked nervous and alert. It was suspicious, so I waited by a lighting bolt, and I observed you. Then I noticed how you stepped off the sidewalk and drew back, and I understood."

"That I'm blind?"

"That you're blind," the stranger confirmed. "With no white cane, however. Exactly how much can you see?"

Kaito waved his hand in front of his face. "I discern movement, but can't count my fingers." It didn't even have a shape—it was blur over blur, blending with spots and fragments of nothing.

Silence ensued, and Kaito reached out to find the stranger was still there. He loved to interpret the silence between them as speechlessness from the other party, bewildered to why Kaito was there, how Kaito managed to get there.

He actually got that a lot.

"You alright?" he asked with no concern whatsoever in his voice.

"I'm processing information," the other said curtly. "I don't understand... Do you even know where you are?"

Kaito made a show of raising both arms, turning slighting on himself as though exhibiting his surroundings. "Who wouldn't? Ekoda's Main Street, of course." He pointed over his shoudler with his thumb as he shoved his other hand in his pocket. "Down that street we have the mall next to a McDonald's, which is across many other boutiques for souvenirs, amongs which we have a flower shop and a bank."

"Yes, yes, indeed," the stranger said, sounding delightfully dumbfounded. "I take that you don't need help to go back home, then?"

"I don't," Kaito confirmed, "but I may need help to find a lovely cafe for our breakfast, though."

"That's," he stammered, and Kaito heard the sole of his shoes drawing against the sidewalk. He was shifting on his feet. "Is that a, a date?"

"Well," Kaito drawled joculy, "I was thinking of it as a way to thank you, since you are the only person who offered help, but if you want it to be a date, I don't have any objections."

"You don't know my name," the other chuckled nervously.

"A matter of time," Kaito said. Judging from how the voice travelled to him, by how the hand held at the crook of his elbow back then, by how the faint figure appeared to his eyes—Kaito raised his arm, and successfully poked the stranger's noise. "So?"

"Can't believe you're blind," he muttered after his aggravated gasp and quick shove of his hand to dismiss Kaito's.

"Hm. Weird name," Kaito winced. "Poor thing."

"It's Kudou Shin'ichi, idiot."

"Kudou Shin'ichi," Kaito said eloquently as he took two steps backwards before bowing theatrically, his world swirling with light dancing around the glassy and drained colours that twitched at his movement. "Kuroba Kaito. Nice to meet you."

And above, in the tiniest voice, he could hear Kudou say, "You too."

* * *

It was crowded, much more crowded than Shin'ichi had ever thought about Ekoda. But then again, they were in downtown, in a more touristic place; it had to be expected.

Sincerely, it was a beautiful day, and despite his excessive bitterness and lack of motivation when Ran had asked him to take the train with her all the way up to Ekoda because there was a friend she wanted to see and because Shin'ichi needed fresh air that didn't hold any dead body particles, he had to admit that it was what some could call a perfect day to hang out. He wasn't down to observe the townscape and describe with ridiculous metaphors how it really looked like, because the reason for his thinking wasn't held with such a thing.

Why was he leading a blind stranger to a cafe again?

His hand at the crook of Kuroba's elbow not only felt utterly out of place, but it also made people double-take as they swam through the crowd. It was beyond Shin'ichi's ability in composure—it was driving him nuts.

His cellphone buzzed in his free hand and he mechanically lifted his arm to look down at it. He'd activated the GPS application and gotten the itinerary to a five stars rated cafe in proximity since he didn't have the slightest idea of the good cafe's whereabouts in a town he, he fact, didn't live in and certainly didn't visit regularly. The last indication faded at the top of the screen, the new one informing they ought to take a turn to their right taking over.

They hadn't really talked since their introduction, and to be fairly honestly with himself, Shin'ichi found it better that way. He'd accepted to be treated with breakfast for his altruism at helping someone he'd suspected to death, and he wasn't quite sure why he'd accepted in the first place—maybe because when he refused, Kuroba insisted—but anyway, it wasn't that he wanted the thing to be over with ASAP, he just wasn't expecting something deep either. He perceived that as something simple.

"We're getting closer," Kuroba said to his side, and when Shin'ichi looked at him, he was grinning. Shin'ichi made a noncommittal sound as a reply, and Kuroba peered to his side, locking his gaze with the detective's. It wasn't the first time, actually, and it made Shin'ichi vehemently wonder if he really was blind. But his rational mind argued back, because the pale, almost white shade suffusing over the bright indigo of Kuroba's eyes, masking the pupils into something gray and crystallising his iris was what made it undeniable he couldn't see. "I wish to tell you that I haven't paid attention during the trip from our encounter spot and the cafe, so it would be kind of you to walk me back to where we met before leaving." He looked sheepish, a bit, before chuckling. "I'm frighteningly lost right now."

Shin'ichi felt a little affronted. He knew he wasn't the most courteous man out there, but it wasn't in his principles to make a blind person roam about aimlessly and leave them alone in their confusion. To know that Kuroba felt the need to talk about it shook Shin'ichi a bit. "Glad to see I make good impressions on people," he said, wincing at how blunt his sarcasm turned out to be.

But Kuroba did nothing but laugh.

They made it to the cafe, and Shin'ichi had to pull on Kuroba's arm for he hadn't stopped exactly when Shin'ichi had, and he might have nearly reiceved the cafe's glassy door straight in the face. He wasn't used to guiding people like that, to have someone's complete trust upon his shoulders in another setting than when it involved decomposition and morally challenged people. That was his excuse.

They made it to the line, and he noticed how Kuroba seemed to be looking around as though he could actually see. But his excessive blinking told otherwise, and it was as Shin'ichi's eyes hazardously landed on Kuroba's ear that he actually realised the other wasn't attempting to look, he was listening—a rather loud rattling sound of a chair had echoed somewhere at the back of the cafe, and just as Kuroba turned his head towards the sound, his ear had twitched. Shin'ichi couldn't help but be fascinated.

"Do they have something interesting?" Kuroba asked almost absently. "I can smell cinnamon roll and too many pastries to decorticate, but that's... about all."

Shin'ichi eyed the rack by the registers. "You summarised the thing," he commented idly. "I'm far from having a sweet tooth so I can't supply on that matter. They have croissant and muffins, though."

"What will you take?" He was looking at him straight in the eyes again.

Shin'ichi felt the need to swallow, his tongue sticking at the roof of his painfully dried mouth. He wasn't dense and certainly wasn't oblivious and he didn't understand why his body reacted this way. He pushed the thought at the back of his head, far away. Now wasn't the time. "Black coffee."

"Is that all?" Kuroba asked incredulously. "Everything smells so good and you decide to drink the nastiest—"

"Why are you complaining? It won't cost you much if I don't take anything," he cared to point out without his nicest tone.

Kuroba's hand rose to rest at the small of Shin'ichi's back. He looked absolutely perfect. Perfect as in not aggravated the slightest. "Look, darling, down on the floor, and tell me the size of the tiles."

What. Shin'ichi needed supplemental effort to notice the line had cropped and how he needed to take few steps ahead, because of all the things Kuroba could've said in response to Shin'ichi's legendary patience, that wasn't one of them. He did look down, however, seeing his foot was a couple of inches away from fitting in perfectly.

He voiced his analysis and Kuroba carried on. "Now, look around and tell me if you can spot an empty table."

"Yes," Shin'ichi replied fast, because he looked over his shoudler and there it was.

"Tell me the layout."

He hummed. "The tables are all for two people, and they are lined three per four. The one I'm looking at is at the third row, in the middle. There's a fake wall right beside us," he took Kuroba's hand and made him touch it, "and the first row of tables is close behind."

Kuroba beamed at him when he tentatively looked to his side, and used his hand that hadn't moved from his back to lightly tap where it layed. "Thanks, go take a seat at that table, I won't be long."

"Okay," came the words out of Shin'ichi's mouth before he could even process things properly. Was Kuroba actually insinuating he would carry the plate with coffee and food on it through a cafe he didn't even know? That was a very interesting interpretation of temerity. "Okay, I'll do that," he said with the intent of making Kuroba realise he was completely insane, but the only reaction he got from it was a toothy smile. Jesus.

And much to his concern, he did just that—he walked to the table, and sat down. He knew staring was impolite, but that was all he could do at Kuroba from where he sat, eyeing him with badly dissimulated concern and skepticism while Kuroba talked to the cashier and flawlessly dug in his wallet for money. He observed as Kuroba's fingers slid on the paper currency, meeting at the corner the little dots, braille, that indicated how much he was actually holding, a movement depicted with clear habit.

The interaction was made, he was given a plate with two mugs of steamy beverage, Shin'ichi barely noticing two saucers on it as well, and Kuroba swirled around, hands full. Despite the boiling urge of either covering his eyes to not witness disaster or jump to his feet and give a hand to Kuroba, Shin'ichi sat there, still and tensed, watching.

Kuroba successfully got around the fake wall that elevated mid-air, with dexterity and a little too fast for Shin'ichi's nervosity. Then he walked with assurance past the first row, the second row, and the sound of the plate gently put on the table made Shin'ichi's jaw drop, Kuroba sitting down across him with the ease of someone gifted with all five senses and maybe ten others.

"So I took you a croissant, even though you asked only for coffee," Kuroba had began to explain but quickly trailed off. "Hello?"

"Hello," Shin'ichi answered back. He hadn't made a single noise since Kuroba's prowess, which he deduced confused the other but he himself was confused, dumbfounded, and he needed recovery time.

"If you don't want me sniffing at your coffee, I suggest you identify our cups yourself," he said, amusement in his voice and visibly oblivious to Shin'ichi's trance. "Since I took hot chocolate."

"It's the one to your right, the, the blue mug," he pointed, still out of words. "You so don't care if it's blue," he then sighed discouragingly.

"I do care," Kuroba denied with a smile. "I've heard it's a pretty colour."

"It's a," he drawled, feeling his tongue thick as he licked his lower lip. He was looking at the mug containing hot chocolate. "It's a darker shade of blue than the sky."

He'd never tried to describe colours before, and his brain failed to find the words to define the colour of the sky so he could then explain how the shades are different. He decided to just forget about it, because it was infuriating to not be able to do something that seemed so simple at first but turned out to be impossible, and so he took the porcelain saucer in which his croissant was waiting to be eaten and drew it closer to himself, absently closing his fingers around the handle of the red mug for a first sip of his coffee.

"Thanks for the breakfast,"  
Shin'ichi said as he remembered, halfway through bringing the mug to his mouth, that he hadn't paid a single thing.

"Thank _you_ ," Kuroba said so earnestly Shin'ichi found it overwhelming. "I think I'm getting closer to visualise the paleness of the sky."

For everlasting seconds, Shin'ichi forgot about his coffee, bemused.

* * *

He reminisced of his moments spent with that man when he was much younger, when he was at an important age to learn his disability wasn't a flaw—when he needed to be accustomed that his visual impairment didn't make him less of an intelligent boy, less of a beautiful human, less valid than anyone else.

That man would always compliment on how his tiny white cane made him look like a gentleman, or a magician. He would always sew a letter of the Braille alphabet in the inside of his clothes, somewhere unnoticeable—he had an A shirt that matched with two A pants, three B shirts that matched with B pants, and many other combinations. It made him proud to be able to dress up alone every morning, and to know he looked good, too. And even years later, Kaito used this technique to match his clothes.

If he managed to pour himself a glass of juice without spilling anything, he was congratulated. Make his bed without anyone helping, spontaneously washing the dishes and putting them away with no ruckus, roaming about the house without knocking anything over; all that deserved him beautiful words and an amiable pat on his back or ruffle of his hair.

He was regularly complimented on his eyes, too. Indigo, with a layer of whitish blue.

"You have the night and the day in your eyes, Kaito, and in them you have hanged the stars yourself."

That was what his father told him, again and again. But he never quite understood what he meant. Later only, as he asked many questions to people, he learned the sky at night was a dark blue, and at day, a paler one—that the night sky was speckled with stars, white dots faintly shining along with the moon, that the starry night sky was wide, unreachable but close alltogether, almost like an illusion.

By the time he learned, his father was gone. He couldn't share his discoveries, ask more questions about his eyes and how the sky seemed to mirror them. So he stopped asking, to also stop the pain that came from knowing too much and bottling everything up.

And now, everything was surging up, he could feel all his questions knot in his throat, because his hot chocolate mug was a darker shade of blue than the sky.

He tried to think of something else, tried to stop his mind wandering in such gloomy places. So he forcibly noticed they were probably sitting by the windows, because light was pouring in his vision and swaddling undefined shapes in bright, yellow blurs glowering through the sharp scratches of glass. A kaleidoscope.

And around him was a symphony of people chatting, silently reading the newspaper, of coffee machine purring in the distance, of chair legs rattling on the floor, the momentary sound of cars and wind rustling leafs whenever the cafe's door was opened. He was concentrating his hearing to the one sitting across him. Kudou Shin'ichi.

"How's the croissant?"

Kudou moved, his shoe knocking Kaito's. "Good, it's, it's good. You don't eat your cinnamon roll?"

Kaito shook his head, and smiled. "I'm not that hungry, actually." And cinnamon rolls weren't easy to eat without smearing his mouth and get his fingers all sticky. But he wouldn't say that to Kudou, of course. He carefully slid his fingers between the mug and its handle, closing his hand around the hot, almost burning porcelain. It was blue. "And your beverage of death?"

Kudou scoffed, the sound resembling more like a choke, actually. Kaito was fairly sure he'd been chewing on a piece of croissant after all. "That's very pejorative for something I take pleasure in drinking on a daily basis."

"Okay, listen there," Kaito said, finding place for his forearms by the edge of the table and leaning in, fingers cold when seperated from the mug. "Do you think I would take cacao straight off the tree and eat it?"

"That wouldn't taste good," Kudou supplied in a matter of fact tone. "And it's not just cacao, it's actually a cacao fruit that contains the main ingredient for choco—"

"Don't jump off the topic, genius," Kaito cut in, amused despite his somewhat impolite interruption. "If you can agree it'd be disastrous, then why are you drinking coffee grains straight out of wherever they came from?"

"It's not the same thing at all," Kudou answered, bewildered.

"Both are bitter, I'll have you know."

"Then it's simply one's choice to make it sweeter."

"What can we make of my choice to make you sweeter, then?"

A very, very interesting silence layed upon them both, and Kaito grinned slyly at his table companion. "Are you blushing?" he asked teasingly, and Kudou was already stammering a reply that didn't sound convincing the slightest. He quickly calculated, where he'd last put his mug, where was his saucer, the sound of Kudou's voice from where he sat, and he brought up his hand without knocking anything over, finding the other's cheek to touch with his fingertips. It was hot, skin warmer than the weather could've managed. "You are!" he said in mock-surprise.

"And _how_ am I supposed to react exactly," Kudou retorted, shooing Kaito's hand away. "You've just told me I'm disgustingly bitter in a runabout way!"

Kaito withdrew his hand to his side of the table, propping his chin in it. "Usually," he began slowly, in a tone someone would use after saying _I think I know, but don't take my words for granted because I don't want to be the cause of any disasters_ , "Usually, people are angry at that. They don't blush, sweetheart."

"Sweetheart," Kudou echoed in a strangled voice. "Don't do that."

Kaito narrowed his eyes at him, for dramatic effect. Tentatively, he enunciated, "Bitterheart?"

"Yeah, right," Kudou said in a dry chuckle. "I rolled my eyes, by the way."

"Shit," Kaito laughed so abruptly he nearly choked, taken aback, "keep telling me these things you do, it's delightful!"

"Then shall I tell you I'm cutting off a piece of my croissant and bringing it to my mouth?" he questioned with gentle sarcasm.

"Yes, do so," Kaito requested, leaning a little more over the table in a show of proving he was being attentive. If he'd be honest with himself, he totally wanted to hear Kudou go through the mondaine process of eating croissant. As weird as it sounded.

"It's, uh—," he trailed off, Kaito feeling Kudou's sudden embarrassment. He hadn't thought that through, clearly. "The piece is kind of like a triangle, like, like that," he took Kaito's hand, and drew with his pinky finger the triangle on the back of his hand. Three corners, three faces. Soft skin. "It's beige. A creamy colour, if I dare say."

"Hold on," Kaito interjected, chuckling. "You weren't so damn descriptive at the roll of your eyes."

"I apologise," Kudou said in a tone that didn't fit his words. "What is it I must absolutely explain?"

Kaito found himself hesitating. He wondered if it showed. "My, your eyes, of course."

"They're blue."

Blue, again. How much of the world was blue? "What kind of shade? Mug-shade, or sky-shade?"

"Ocean-shade." Kudou cleared his throat. "My mom once, uh, she once told me poets would write verses on my eyes. _Drown in the blue of his eyes_ or something alike, you know."

"It must be breathtaking, then," Kaito said softly. Kudou made a noncommittal sound, the bell over the cafe's door chimed. "It _has_ to be," he murmured, and that was the end of their conversation.

* * *

Shin'ichi was people watching, the red mug locked between his hands. A woman surged down the sidewalk, long strides at the top of her toes, heels definitely longer than necessary. How wasn't she wobbling in her steady steps, Shin'ichi didn't know. A father with his daughter were eating ice cream on a bench, a bunch of teen noisily passing by. There, a lady staring at her watch ran down the road, probably late for something. Judging by her accoutrement, an interview.

He brought the mug to his lips, his coffee was cold.

His eyes wandered off the window in a lazy focus, landing on the untouched cinnamon roll sitting in the white, very white saucer. The sugary creaming, that had leaked and melted against the warmth of the pastry was now crackled, cold. Probably as cold as his coffee. And behind the saucer, no one.

He didn't know Kuroba, could only guess his age was around 22-25, had no idea what was his job—he was a stranger. They were strangers. But so were Shin'ichi and criminals, and it didn't refrain him from deducing major facets of their life.

And Kuroba wasn't any different, albeit his, hopefully, clear criminal record. Shin'ichi was at lost.

A light tap on his shoudler made him look up for the source of it. "I can't differentiate the restrooms," Kuroba told him, sheepishly. Shin'ichi hadn't thought about that eventuality when Kuroba had excused himself. They were in an era which modelled society and public places to help people with disabilities, and most restrooms by now had Braille under the scripture MEN/WOMEN. That cafe, five stars excluded, didn't have those. "I need your eyes."

"Yeah, sure," Shin'ichi said, already on his feet. He caugh the cinnamon roll in his peripheral vision, and subconsciously squeezed Kuroba's arm. "Wait here, just a sec."

The other nodded, and he darted for the cashier to ask for anything he could use to take the pastry on-the-go. He knew Kuroba desperately wanted to eat it, and that he was the cause he left it untouched and to the dried air's mercy. It was fairly simple, actually, because Shin'ichi himself wouldn't have dared eating a cinnamon roll eyes closed and facing someone who could witness the mess it'd make. Kuroba was straightforward, lacked boundaries and a shameless flirt—he however obviously chosed to look good in front of Shin'ichi, to not take a chance of making a fool of himself. Shin'ichi knew why, but didn't understand.

Once it was taken care of, he repatriated the dishes and put them at their proper place for someone to pick them up and clean them, and he followed Kuroba to the reclusive part of the cafe, where the restrooms were. There were three doors, one labelled _For employees only_ , undoubtedly the concierge. He walked past Kuroba and pushed at the door for the men's bathroom, where three stalls lined against a tiled and freakishly bright wall. "Over here," he said, Kuroba instantly finding his voice and gingerly making his way in.

It smelled of hygienic product, which was reassuring but at the same time, assaulting. As Kuroba found his way to a stall, Shin'ichi went to the sink, where he could wash his hands for he ate the croissant with them, making his fingertips greasy of butter. He caught his reflection on the huge mirror upon the wall, neon lights casting white luminosity straight over him.

He looked tired, bags heavy under his eyes and tinted with a fading blue that blended with the paleness of his skin. His hair wasn't perfectly combed to assure him the usual professional look he liked to show, and his tie knot was low on his unbuttoned collar. The soap smelled of lavender.

As he closed the tap, water started flowing to his left, and in the mirror, he saw Kuroba washing his hands, eyes never meeting the glass.

"I may sound like I'm attacking you," Shin'ichi began hesitantly, not failing to see the slight arc of Kuroba's eyebrow, as he found the brown paper to dry his hands. "But you are aware every bathroom have mirrors, right?"

Kuroba looked over his shoulder to where Shin'ichi had moved, a smile scotched to his face. Normally, whenever people talked together in front of a mirror, they tended to—they always—talked through their reflections. Kuroba didn't. "Blind doesn't ryme with uncultured," he said with no resentment at all. "Why? Is the mirror I'm facing magical?"

Shin'ichi rolled his eyes, ommiting to tell Kuroba this time. Suppressing the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth at their earlier exchange—for whom? nobody could see him—, he walked to the counter so he could lean against it. "It's an automatism for human beings to stare at their reflection on a mirror, or on anything they catch their reflection on. I thought maybe you would, too."

Was it for Shin'ichi's contentment, or was it an attempt at the impossible, he didn't know, but Kuroba, after hearing these words, faced the mirror, his reflection staring right back into his eyes.

He chuckled wryly. "I don't even know how I look like," he said under his breath, his voice sinking with the sound of him closing the tap. Shin'ichi handed him paper he could dry himself with, and at the touch of it, he looked midly surprised, blinking. "Thanks."

"Haven't you tried tracing the layout of your face to know?" Shin'ichi asked him, finding himself to be truly curious instead of having asked for the sheer thought of doing small talk.

Kuroba nodded. "Of course, but it's never as authentic, and, uh," he made a movement in the air with his dried hand, and it smelled of lavender, "it's like touching a tree. It's rough, it's not agreeable; if you run your hands up and down the trunk, you end up injured. Yet people keep telling me it's beautiful, but how am I to know?"

"Did you just compare your skin to bark?" Shin'ichi asked with more concern than he'd cared to allow in his voice. It was just that one thing was crystal clear whenever Shin'ichi looked at Kuroba, and it was that his skin seemed to feel like velvet.

Kuroba quirked an eyebrow at him. "My skin is soft as fuck, thank you," he said pointedly, feigning to be wounded, and Shin'ichi cringed at the sudden delusion Kuroba might have read his mind. "I was actually trying to tell you that no matter what I feel of my face, or of anyone's face for that matter, it will never be like seeing an actual image."

"You," Shin'ichi stuttered, swallowing and feeling needles stinging throughout his throat. "You touch people's face?"

"Friends, family," Kuroba said offhandedly. "Don't everyone visually impaired do?"

Shin'ichi absently took the crumpled and wet brown paper from Kuroba's hand to throw it away in a disposer screwed against the wall.

Kuroba didn't eat his cinnamon roll because it was a messy collation and Shin'ichi was there, he kept flirting with him the duration of their breakfast, and brought him for breakfast—Shin'ichi felt palpitation, his mouth was so dry it hurt, he was undeniably nervous around Kuroba.

Facts. These were facts.

Then why wasn't Shin'ichi able to draw a conclusion?

"Most people, when asked how they look like, answer so vaguely it becomes impossible to even hope differentiating them," Kuroba continued, Shin'ichi licking his lips haphazardly when indigo and blue—when a sky met an ocean. "I've heard so many people describe themselves with poor details when I was younger, I thought everyone looked exactly the same," he laughed.

"People don't go as far as saying they're pretty or good-looking in fear of sounding egocentric or narcissistic," he replied, Kuroba shaking his head as he tsk'ed.

"People don't go as far as saying how their eyebrows point, how their nose curve, how their jawline and cheekbones define their face, how their lips stretch when they smile, how their ears are shaped, because they don't know these are what make them special and different from everyone else. Not the colour of their hair, not whether social conventions call them pretty or good-looking or not." He paused, bitting his upper lip before sighing heavily. "Not the colour of their eyes, either. Because it's a repetitive pattern on humans."

Shin'ichi hummed, at a search for words, then asked softly, "Are your eyes a repetitive pattern?"

"Oh, oh? Have the tables turned?" he gasped exaggeratedly. "Are you flirting with me?" he loudly whispered with a tone reserved for people talking about lizard presidents.

"I thought we were having a normal conversation here," Shin'ichi said evenly. "Shouldn't get high hopes with you, apparently."

Kuroba grinned at him as he walked to the door, not even fumbling to find the handle. "Lovely to see you're catching up on me," he said with a wriggle of his eyebrows and winked before getting out the restroom.

It was only when the door quietly shut that Shin'ichi realised he hadn't moved, that he was still leaning against the counter, sinks behind and to his side, a little bit of water splattered around the one he'd used, nothing where Kuroba had washed his hands.

Brown bag with the cinnamon roll at the very corner of the counter.

It still smelled of lavender when he ran his hands rigorously on his face, exhaling ever so loudly he started, wondering exactly how much of the world he could actually see.

Apparently not as much as Kuroba.

* * *

The repetitive sound of cars coming and going, tires gripping to the ground and crawling forward to make the metallic engine go forward was like a knife in Kaito's stomach. And it twisted in, tortuously deepening the wound.

They were back to the funky crossroad, that still happened to be funky as a matter of fact, and slowly, finger per finger, lingering, he felt Kudou's hand leave the crook of his elbow. Just like one would tilt his head forward, would lean in to make a kiss last a little more eternally, he found his arm following the withdrawal of the hand. A palm brushed his forearm, chaste, sending warm shivers down Kaito's spine, and making his skin swoon in goosebumps, butterflies dancing in his stomach.

"Thanks again for the breakfast," Kudou said so calmly, so placidly—was it just Kaito, then? The hand wandered lower on his arm, fingertips and the tip of nearly cut nails tracing invisible, fragile lines on his skin, trailing off to his wrist. It tugged on Kaito's hand until his palm faced upward, and something scrappy, like paper, was propped in it. "Your cinnamon roll."

He startled a bit before chuckling. And here he thought it'd been thrown away with the rest of their garbage, with the plate, the saucers, the beige croissant's crumples and the blue mug. "That's when you asked me to _wait just a sec_ , right?" he mused aloud, smiling with what he hoped looked like something polite, something that didn't cross the line between both their status as strangers towards each other. "Before going to the restroom?"

"Yes," Kudou confirmed, some sort of amusement blooming upon his even voice. "I thought you'd be happy to eat it later."

"Well, you thought right," Kaito said with emphasis, unrolling the bag at its aperture to smell in it. Blending painfully with the smell of the brown wrapper was the smell of a cold pastry. He closed it back. "I won't hold you anymore. I think you lost enough time by now," he said jokingly, but Kudou's voice didn't level his tone.

"It would've been a waste of time if I hadn't have fun," he said, leaving the words drip before the silence. "You're interesting to talk to," he continued after a significant pause, "you hold onto your beliefs with ridiculous devotion, yet you still manage to have ears for what others think. Not everyone can do that. They either give up their opinions, or discard anything else from anyone. You don't."

Kaito didn't find the force to theatrically gasp, to act all slyly and far from humble. He just blinked once, twice, thrice—hell, what kind of face was Kudou making? The light obnoxiously knocking around in his vision seemed vicious, it was purposely giving any shapes blur at the edge, it was melting Kudou's figure into nothing, absolutely nothing. It was distasteful. He needed to know how Kudou looked like when he said these words, wanted to read his face and discern any traces of mockery, or maybe dishonest.

But he just stayed there, hands cupping the little brown bag. "It was refreshing talking to you too, I have to admit."

Movements, shoe soles against the ground. "So, uh," Kudou trailed off into a sigh, a heavy sigh. "You don't need help to go back home?"

It sounded rhetorical. It was, probably, since they'd both went through this already, so inevitably, he knew Kaito could make it back to his house alone, safe and sound. Kudou had asked it, rather sarcastically and through his surprise, "I take it you don't need help to go back home, then?" before they even knew each other's name. After he'd help him cross the funky street.

But now they knew. Kuroba Kaito, Kudou Shin'ichi. He knew Kudou disdained his coffee sweet just as much as Kaito disdained it bitter, how Kudou tended to march firmly in the rational area of subjects they've discussed—he knew Kudou was asking questions more than he talked, that he was curious, that he probably decorticate every single sentences to words and letters Kaito had said just to be sure he got everything right. And he knew his eyes were blue.

Ocean-blue.

Kudou had asked if he needed help going home, not with surprise nor sarcasm. With concern for someone wanting a beloved one safe and sound in their house, with the voice of someone waiting for the other to go past their front door before driving away. With the voice of someone expecting a phonecall before going to bed.

It was different.

"Doesn't it feel like déjà vu?" Kaito said softly.

"It's not déjà vu if the events are different," Kudou replied as softly.

"It's that simple?" Kaito asked joculy, and Kudou across him chuckled. "Then yes, yes I do. I do and you are lovely."

"Okay," Kudou enuciated as his hand made its way back at the crook of Kaito's elbow, before slidding down his arm to lace their fingers together, palms squeezing shut. "That's," he stammered, "that's... alright with you?"

"Mh-mh," he hummed approvingly, his thumb caressing the skin under it. "With you?"

"Yeah." Kudou made a slow step forward, giving Kaito the time to feel he was about to walk, and in a lazy stroll, with a pace that almost made everyone around think they weren't heading anywhere, they let a comfortable silence slip in. Kudou hadn't ask for his address, so he had absolutely no idea of where they were actually going, but he didn't care. Instead, Kaito wondered if Kudou could feel through his hand, his wrist rubbing against Kudou's his erratic heartbeat that would be greatly alarming in other settings. "Oh, now that I think about it," he suddenly said, "I _will_ get to see you eat the cinnamon rolls."

The words sank in before Kaito shot his head towards Kudou. "You asshole. You knew?"

"I knew," he echoed, and was that the hint of a smug smile toying in his voice?

"What _even_ are you?"

"A detective."

Kaito huffed, but the toothy smile spreading across his face told otherwise. " _My_ detective," he singsonged and certainly didn't wait before reaching out for Kudou's cheek, carefully to not hit him with the brown bag. The back of his hand met warm skin, soft skin. The skin of Kudou's face. The skin of Shin'ichi's cheek. "My _blushing_ lil' detective!"

"Shut up," he muttered.

And Kaito now believed in love at first sight.

* * *

 **BONUS**

"Are you facing me?"

"Yes, yes," Shin'ichi said, "You've asked that question for the fourth time now."

"Do we go for a fifth?"

"What?"

"Are you facing me?"

Shin'ichi chuckled, completely discouraged. He couldn't help his gaze lingering longer on that smile, those eyes that seemed to hold the universe. They were both in Kaito's house, sitting legs crossed on his bed, closed to one another. If one of them moved too brusquely, or if Kaito bounced on himself like he'd been doing for the past minute, then their knees would touch, their feet would push. "We've been facing each other for ten minutes now," he assured, smiling dopily at the most childish man he'd ever met.

"Okay, okay," he babbled, giggling. "I suggest you don't move, while I do that, mhkay?"

"I'm not moving," Shin'ichi said, sitting still and leaning in to be at better reach for Kaito. "Whenever you want."

He'd accepted to have his face groped by Kaito so he could picture him better in his head, despite how being touched by people often made him ridiculously irritable. Kaito was the exception, maybe.

Kaito found his face with no troubles, and was feeling any features with intense concentration. He ran back and forth on his jaw line, from his chin to the back of his ears, them cupped his cheeks and pressed a little harder on his cheekbones—Shin'ichi had closed his eyes as Kaito parted his thumbs from his face to trace near his nose, then over his eyelids with the softness of velvet, like one would handle a bird's wing. His eyebrows were soothed under Kaito's press, and his bangs were shoved away when it was to his forehead.

It was overwhelming to be touched that much, Shin'ichi had to admit.

"Your lips are," Kaito drawled, his hands gently making their way to his jawline and his thumbs groping until it found the corners of his mouth.

"Right here," Shin'ichi said, leaning in to meet Kaito's.

It was quick, chaste. In a blink of an eye, he was already back at a respectable distance from Kaito's face, which was suffusing with the slight shade of pink.

Along with his eyes, it looked like a sunset.

"And you really think I could evaluate that so quickly?"

Shin'ichi chuckled at how exaggeratedly Kaito seemed almost offended. "Fair enough," he said, and kissed Kaito who was grinning against his lips.

It tasted of cinnamon rolls.

* * *

 _Hope you liked it! Feel free to review, it'd make me happy!_

 _This is my first time publishing a fanfiction ever, and I can't tell if I'll do it again for sure because I have this horrible tendancy of not finishing what I start. I'm a little astonished that I managed to finish this one, believe me, it's a miracle._

 _But maybe we'll see each other soon, who knows. For now, though, thanks again, and bye!_


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